Art shows nature

Here in Bloomington, artist Marcy Neiditz isn’t recreating Michelangelo’s “David” or Auguste Rodin’s “The Thinker.” She’s doing something all her own. She makes whimsical and abstract ceramic sculptures that incorporate plant culture and molecules into her work.\nNeiditz creates everything from functional works of art such as trays, serving dishes, containers and mugs to abstract pieces such as flowery-topped teapots, vessels and plant-life sculptures. She is currently working on creating different tops to her teapots and on new sculpture pieces. Many of Neiditz’s pieces focus on seed pods of plants, which are often small parts of the plant. Her pieces are also inspired by nature and plant life. \nIn her time spent not working on her art, she’s working near art, as director of the Prima Gallery at 109 E. Sixth St., where some of her own work is also on display. The John Waldron Arts Center also occasionally displays some of Neiditz’s work. She will also display some pieces at the local Arts Fair on the Square in June.\n“I like the idea that, you know, things seem like they’re plants and they seem maybe a little bit like they’re animals, and they have sort of personality, but they’re abstracted a little bit,” Neiditz said.\nHer experiences as a landscape designer working in garden centers and greenhouses adds to her love for plant culture. She even has a microscope that she uses to capture certain parts of an object she later composites into a 3-D sketch and then into her sculptures. \n“My work is more inventive,” Neiditz said, “so I don’t specifically look at an object and then sculpt that object. Often what I start with is one little component, and I love the idea that things are growing molecule by molecule.” \nSitting down in her studio to work, she doesn’t always have a plan for what she wants to create. Most often she will sit down and look through her box of parts and go from there. With something like her teapots or plant pod sculptures, she will most often work in series.\nBorn in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1957, Neiditz said her love for pottery started in 1979. She was working in a home-improvement store and saw an ad for a pottery class. Living in Los Angeles at the time, she began renting out studio space to work. Later on, after working and continuing her art, she became self-employed in 1991 and got her Bachelor of Fine Arts in ceramics from California State University – Long Beach in 1996. Neiditiz also received her Master of Fine Arts in ceramics from IU in 2000. \nHer pieces explore beauty in the everyday world in both an abstract and functional way, bringing their own definition of beauty to art, she said. \n“I like things that are alive, but it doesn’t mean that alive has to be pretty and beautiful colors,” Neiditz said.